Charlie Daniels: Failed Messiah?

A couple weeks ago, my summer officially began. It was the inaugural concert of the summer concert series at the Magic Springs amusement park in Hot Springs. My $49.99 season pass gets me into all the concerts all summer. An extra 5 bucks a show in March reserved me seats on the 3rd row, middle aisle. The season kicked off in style with the Charlie Daniels Band. Admittedly, Magic Springs has become the last stop before assisted living for many old school classic rock and R&B bands. But that didn't stop the CDB from bringing it to thousands of unappreciative season passholders. I'm well aware of the politically insane, often right-wing, lyrics of many Charlie Daniel's songs. I grew up listening to "The South's Gonna Do it Again" and hearing Charlie condemn the Russians to hell in "In America." Much of my early theology was quite consistent with and fueled by "The Devil Went Down to Georgia." That Saturday night I decided before my rollercoastered behind ever sat down that I was going to put all my academic and progressive scruples on hold for 90 minutes. I was going to join in and celebrate my Southern heritage in a true redneck fashion and hoop and holler you haven't seen since Brown vs. Board of Education. The band was hot, and Charlie did his part from the opening song in which he broke his fiddle bow, to the much-anticipated "Devil" solo before he lays the golden fiddle on the ground at Johnny's feet. Charlie did seem to tame his message a bit, though, I guess for the benefit of the kids in the audience, or those fans now on medicare. He struggled to tone his swear words down and he did change "Russians" to "enemies" in his condemnation of America's foes. Still, he presented proudly his pride in being a misunderstood Redneck and offered a justice system for drug dealers based on hanging rather than trial by peers. The music was great and I was fully caught up in the show. The surprise came when I realized that I was not struggling to keep up with the redneck crowd as I had anticipated, I was leading the charge alone. Very few cheers and "hell yeahs!" were uttered by the crowd when Charlie presented his gospel. This concert crowd differed immensely from the same Charlie Daniels crowd you would have experienced in Arkansas 30 years ago. Most of these people just didn't get excited about Dixie, God, America, and rednecks. It was almost as if a culture was dying before my eyes. I had the same feeling when my grandmother died last year and I hailed her as the "Last Southern Lady" in my eulogy. Southern rock, fiddles, family, and bearded obesity, just don't play out like they used to, despite the fact that Charlie Daniels sounds as good as ever. Near the end of the concert, Charlie sat down on a stool with his acoustic guitar and unapologetically professed his belief in Jesus and his love of gospel music. He said he always played one gospel song in all his shows. He then went into a powerful and emotive version of "How Great Thou Art" reminding everyone of just what a great voice he has. His gospel song was interrupted however, by at least 2 statements hurled from the crowd to the stage. One guy a few rows back yelled, "Don't get religious on us! Pick something else!." Not what I expected from a Magic Springs crowd at a CDB concert. Another voice quickly countered, however. The slightly innebriated woman in her 60's sitting next to me shouted, "Give 'em your testimony! Charlie Daniels you are our saviour!" Suddenly, I realized in that moment where we stand culturally and theologically in Arkansas in 2009. The frustrated failure of Charlie Daniel's religion making it's last stand against a post-modern skepticism. I wish the battle for our religious soul was a simple as a fiddle showdown in Georgia. We may be at the end of the era of the Southern religious simplicity of the Charlie Daniels Band, but I'm gonna take my hat off as he leaves the stage.

Dunk the Chaplain for Cereal's Sakes!

June marks the month of our annual VA hospital cereal drive. The goal is 15,000 boxes of cereal donated for children in our community. We are most of the way there. Over 2000 dollars was raised just this past Friday via our dunking booth at the Little Rock and North Little Rock campuses. A huge success, yours truly can't claim any credit for the dunking booth's windfall. Always eager to take one for the team, I volunteered to represent the chaplains for a 15 minute shift atop the homemade dunking booth. This was the first year the chaplain's department would get to mount the booth. We were excited. We broke into the priest's closet and got a candle-snuffing brass scepter and a baptismal robe. My boss coughed up a clerical collar. I dressed in black and was ready to go. I was ready to taunt my fellow employees in King James English while watching them delight in taking out their frustrations on a minister in a dunking booth, all for a good cause. Such was not the case. After jettisoning my robe in order to keep from drowning, I sat lonely and embarrassed for 10 long minutes of silent dunklessness. The administrator before me? Dunked more than a dozen times rapid fire. When the clergy took the stage, however, the dunking ceased. My prophetic calls to "Dunk Thy Neighbor!" fell on deaf ears. One lady paid her money walked up and then immediately sat down when she saw who was up for dunking. "Aw, Naw, I ain't gonna dunk him, I'll just wait." "That just wouldn't seem right," another said, as my fellow volunteers tried to feverishly prime the pump by dunking me. I shouted to the lady, "Aw, C'mon, I know you've been done wrong by a minister at some point in your life!" To no avail. After towelling off my embarrassment, I realized a painful truth. People talk smack about ministers all the time. They often gossip about them, vote them out of their churches, and blame them for causing them to leave the church. But when the get a chance to get even publicly, they balk. Is there still a healthy respect for clergy despite all the scandals and abuse that ministers have been involved in for millenia? Or do people not want to make public their realization that ministers are humans too and worthy of a good dunking. Are they taking ministers too seriously? Or are they taking themselves too seriously? I remember a family member chastizing his wife in a hospital room several years ago. She said "damn!" and was quickly rebuked. "Can't you see this is a man of the cloth!", her husband retorted. He then tried to make an appeal for her to give up her chair for me. I felt a bit ridiculous, much the same as i did when the dunking booth screeched to a halt and they unloaded me 5 minutes before my shift was up. I felt like a bad stripper who cleared out the bar in one routine. I wanted to make a final plea for all ministers before leaving the dunking booth. "Stop treating us with kid gloves and stop hiding behind our supposed moral superiority." We Baptists call it the "priesthood of all believers." The VA cereal drive calls it, "Go ahead and dunk the chaplain for cereal's sakes!"

You can always turn your ass around. (part 4)

Balaam blew it. He disobeyed God. He went in a direction that the shouldn’t have. He couldn’t even see the angel God sent. And then he beat the donkey who was trying to save his life. Fortunately, the story doesn’t end here. Here’s the final verse of the passage quoted earlier from Numbers: “Balaam said to the angel of the LORD, "I have sinned, for I did not know that you were standing in the way against me. Now then, if it is displeasing to you, I will turn back.” (22:34)

Balaam comes face to face with his predicament. He has sufficiently become humbled by an invisible angel with a sword and a talking donkey. His “sin is ever before him” as David says in Psalm 53. Balaam doesn’t go the way of some Biblical characters when confronted with their mistakes. Saul continued in his rebellion and the Lord’s spirit left him. Peter avoided Jesus until the risen Christ busted him out on his denial. Judas Iscariot hung himself. Balaam simply admitted his mistake and asked if it was okay if he repented and turned back. The final lesson of the Balaam/donkey story is that we can always turn our ass around. Turning back doesn’t undo the stupid things we do. It doesn’t mean we are instantly back in the place where we were when we first headed down the wrong path. It doesn’t save us the shame that we face by admitting we were wrong. It doesn’t save us the pain of remembering the days or years we wasted as we head back the right direction. But it does mean that we follow a God of 7th chances. Three angels appearances and three donkey beatings, and yet God doesn’t give up on Balaam. And doesn’t give up on you and me. We may suck but we can change. The book is not finished yet. God can shake your etch-a-sketch clean and you can draw again with a clean slate. This is the good news. There is hope, there is forgiveness, there is a new day. Even if it takes a divine donkey to get us there.

Don’t beat the Donkey. (part 3)

Balaam’s donkey sees the angel in the road with his sword drawn and wisely detours into a nearby field. Balaam is clueless as to the reason for donkey disobedience and whips him like a redheaded stepchild. The donkey falls in line and again runs into the angel in a narrow path where he is forced to squeeze up against a wall to avoid the angel. Unfortunately, Balaam’s foot gets trapped between the donkey and the wall. Balaam goes for round two of the donkey whacking. Both the angel and the donkey are persistent, however. The angel appears the third time in such a way that there’s no way the donkey can get around him. At this point, the donkey simply lays down under Balaam and incurs Balaam’s final PETA infraction, a third beating. Mr. Ed has had enough at this point and basically exclaims, “What did I ever do to you to deserve this triple crown of ass-whooping?” The donkey’s question is legitimate. Without realizing it, Balaam was whipping the messenger. The donkey is unaware of Balaam’s angelic blindness and thinks she is just doing her job. Here’s an aside. Ironic that God was able to “open the mouth” of a female donkey and speak prophetically through her in circa 1500 BCE, but God still struggles with being able to speak through a female person in most religious circles 3500 years later. hmm. At any rate, Balaam beats the donkey that is only guilty of trying to help him. We all do our share of donkey beating when we are faced with news we don’t really want to hear. God often uses asses to get our attention and we resent it. It’s the honest comment of an ex. It’s the co-worker or sibling who rats on us. It’s the painful truth that Kim Yazza wanted to break up with me in the 8th grade but got her friend Scotty to call me and tell me during an episode of Hee-Haw in 1978. Whatever the bad news, it’s usually not the fault of the messenger. We must not get in the habit of beating our donkeys. Sometimes they are the only people in our lives who will tell us the truth. As soon as we respond to criticism and bad news by flashing our defensive, insecure colors, we begin to silence our critics and the truth starts to disappear from our office, home, and soul. Our donkeys all get tired of getting beaten. They eventually lay down and we’re alone on our path to destruction.

Special Edition: MLK's Deadday

"Early morning, April 4, shot rings out in a Memphis sky...'Free at Last!' they took your life, they could not take your Pride!"

Bono got the time of day wrong, it was in the evening, but he captured the power of that fateful day at the Lorraine Motel in 1968. Interestingly, our country is pretty good about remembering the birthday of many of our American heroes. A few have even dotted the calenders of January and February as national holidays. Not much is said, however, about the significance of the day they died, with the exception of JFK. Few of us remember, for example, that is was April 15 that Lincoln died, the morning after he took a bullet in Ford's theater. Probably one of the most significant days in our nation's history was April 12 when our country mourned the death of 4 term president Franklin D Roosevelt. Most of us remember vividly the death of Ronald Reagan and the televised funerals that filled our cable stations. It's doubtful, however, that June 5 will ever have even a footnote on our pocket calenders. The same is true with Martin Luther King, Jr. Debate went on for decades in Congress before Reagan pulled the trigger on making a national holiday for Martin Luther King.

I had a friend in Thailand many years ago who laughed at her own butchering of the English language on an almost daily basis. Being very familiar with the term "Birthday" and its wide use and importance to Americans, she jokingly tried to draw attention to the significance of the day one of her friend's died. Her face broke into a wide smile as the began to translate to English using the self-created crass term "Deadday." The truth is that those of us who have lost loved ones in the past know that the most painful days fall on the anniversaries of the day they died, not the day they were born. It is the deaddays that stick out most in our minds and carry the greatest weight of meaning and emotion.

And so it is with Martin Luther King's death. It may have been difficult to get our nation to recognize the great civil rights leader's birthday, but imagine how difficult it would have been to set aside a day to honor the anniversary of the evening we took him out. MLK's birth represents the coming of age of a nation who realized it was time to clean house, swallow the pride of admitting our own mistakes, and forge a new era for all people. His death stands as a reminder that the stakes are high. That we'll never all get there. That the cost of change is paid in blood. And that the impact of our lives cannot be stopped by a 38 mm bullet. It is also a reminder that we are pretty good about killing off those who make the greatest difference in our nation. Lincoln, JFK, RFK, and MLK to name a few. There was another who understood the meaning of Bono's lyrics in "Pride." The death of MLK and the coming of Easter remind us that Jesus wasn't just giving us a sound byte when he said, "take up your cross, and follow me." The pain of remembering Martin Luther King's, Jesus', or our own family member's deaddays is real. But it comes with the hope of knowing that the bullet, the nail, the cancer, the heart-attack, and the car wreck, don't get the last word. The gospel, the fight for equal rights, the love of a mother, brother, or wife who's gone, lives on. Just wait.

God thinks outside the Balaam. (part 2)

God’s first attempt to get Balaam’s attention was to send an angel in his path. This divine portent was not enough, however, and a more practical approach was needed. So God enlisted the help of the donkey. While Balaam the prophet was blind to the obvious presence of a sword-drawn angel standing in front of him, his donkey could see it quite clearly and wisely avoided the angelic showdown. There are many among the faithful in the church who are the logical ones to perceive a divine truth. But such is not always the case. Last Sunday I experienced a horribly sad situation in which a local Spanish-speaking family woke to find their 10 month-old not breathing. The baby girl was dead on arrival at the hospital, apparently the result of several serious, chronic, illnesses the baby had gone through since birth. I arrived at the hospital and found the two sobbing parents on either side of their baby, holding her life-less hands. The family’s sorrow was compounded by the fact they spoke no English, had little extended family here, and had no financial resources to deal with the prospect of a funeral and burial for their child. They turned to the chaplain for help. I in turn took the next seemingly logical step and began to contact local churches with ministries to the Hispanic communities. My desire was for the family to have someone who spoke their language, could provide them with emotional support and assist them financially or logistically with funeral arrangements. Unfortunately, the baby picked a bad time to die. It was straight up 11 a.m on Sunday morning. I guess everyone was too preoccupied with worshipping God to deal with this couple’s untimely problem. 5 phone calls to churches and 4 ministerial voicemails later, I finally closed my cell phone. The minutes passed as now the family was alone, waiting for help, the baby having been taken to the coroner. The minutes turned to hours without a single returned phone call from the “emergency-line” voicemails. I finally abandoned my divine plan to begin with the church, realizing that none of my fellow Christian travelers could see the angel standing in front of them in the road. I opened up the yellow-pages and called the first funeral home I could find. The funeral director called me back in minutes, ready to make arrangements to pick up the baby’s body and offered funeral service for free.. He also offered to contact a cemetery that provides free burial space for families in need and agreed to coordinate the entire process. The family was relieved and finally able to go home. The church answering machines remained full. The donkey could see what the prophets could not.

“God speaks through Balaam’s Ass” (part 1)

The book of Numbers lands as the 4th book in the Hebrew canon, right after Leviticus. While Leviticus is most known for its detailed and often comical requirements for ceremonial purity, Numbers is best known for nothing. Nothing, that is, until the fascinating narraitive of the prophet Balaam and his stubborn, talking donkey. This is provocative tale of spiritual blindness, donkey abuse, and repentence. A close examination of this text will reveal several truths that will aid us in the quest for the porpoise-driven life.
The Angel and Balaam Numbers 22
22But God was angry because he was going, and the angel of the LORD took his stand in the way as an adversary against him. Now he was riding on his donkey and his two servants were with him. 23When the donkey saw the angel of the LORD standing in the way with his drawn sword in his hand, the donkey turned off from the way and went into the field; but Balaam struck the donkey to turn her back into the way. 24Then the angel of the LORD stood in a narrow path of the vineyards, with a wall on this side and a wall on that side. 25When the donkey saw the angel of the LORD, she pressed herself to the wall and pressed Balaam's foot against the wall, so he struck her again. 26The angel of the LORD went further, and stood in a narrow place where there was no way to turn to the right hand or the left. 27When the donkey saw the angel of the LORD, she lay down under Balaam; so Balaam was angry and struck the donkey with his stick. 28And the LORD opened the mouth of the donkey, and she said to Balaam, "What have I done to you, that you have struck me these three times?" 29Then Balaam said to the donkey, "Because you have made a mockery of me! If there had been a sword in my hand, I would have killed you by now." 30The donkey said to Balaam, "Am I not your donkey on which you have ridden all your life to this day? Have I ever been accustomed to do so to you?" And he said, "No." 31Then the LORD opened the eyes of Balaam, and he saw )the angel of the LORD standing in the way with his drawn sword in his hand; and he bowed all the way to the ground. 32The angel of the LORD said to him, "Why have you struck your donkey these three times? Behold, I have come out as an adversary, because your way was (V)contrary to me. 33"But the donkey saw me and turned aside from me these three times. If she had not turned aside from me, I would surely have killed you just now, and let her live." 34Balaam said to the angel of the LORD, "I have sinned, for I did not know that you were standing in the way against me. Now then, if it is displeasing to you, I will turn back."

This story is important theologically for a number of reasons besides being a forerunner of the popular CBS sitcom, “Mr. Ed” (1961). Let us elucidate some of its sublime truths.

1. The wrong path can lead to blindness.
Balaam is not the only Biblical character to experience vision problems on the road. The pre-apostle Saul was on the way to Damascus to take out a few Christians when he was “blinded by the light” (Manfred Mann’s Earth Band, 1977). His trip down the wrong road led to a bout with temporary blindness, an epic conversion experience and a name change to “Paul” or “the apostle formerly known as Saul.” Balaam too is on the wrong road and is clearly headed somewhere that God didn’t want him to go. Would that I had a bowl of GrapeNuts for every wrong road I’ve gotten on, whether it be the blind following of map quest, or the entrance ramp to a bad marital highway. Balaam is in a similar sedan, without his spiritual GPS.
Several attempts were made to stop Balaam’s journey and send him another way. The primary divine tactic was one used often in Scripture, the sending of an angel. We find countless angels in the sacred writings of many religions and they play a prominent role in both the Hebrew and Christian scriptures. In this case the angel is placed smack in the middle of the Balaam’s road. Sometimes divine warnings come like flashing blue lights on the interstate. Others appear right in the median of our “highway to hell”(AC/DC, 1978). More often though, we’re so used to driving the road leading to nowhere that our minds are numbed to the green and brown markers lining the access roads. We all have taken many a turn that puts us on a road that is clearly nowhere near the ultimate desired destination. Much like Bruce Springsteen in “Hungry Heart” (1983), “we take a wrong turn and we just keep going.” Once on this Balaam road of destruction, we find it more and more difficult to see the truth. Balaam’s angel was right in front of him. Unfortunately, Balaam’s pre-occupation with his own agenda blinded him to the appearance of the angel standing on the double-yellow line of his cart path. The warning sign was there, he just couldn’t see it.. Fortunately, unbeknownced to Balaam, God had sent along a seeing eye donkey.